… by purchasing one square foot (not even a square metre) of land on the Isle of Jura in Scotland. For £37. What a bargain.

*cough*

It’s amazing what you can find on the Internet, hey?

Total number of days counted was just nine
Total jogging distance was a measly 9.6km
Total walking distance was a measly 5.4km

To see it full-size, please click on the image

A slow start, but it’s a start. I’m trying to increase my distance by 400m every time I go to the track.

Ching Cheong has been sentenced to five years. His lawyer doesn’t want to reveal too much with regards to the specifics of the penalty, but the China Daily is quite happy to. Apparently,

According to the verdict, Ching Cheong is also deprived of political rights for one year and personal property worth 300,000 yuan (about US$37,500) has been confiscated.”The penalty is a mitigated one considering that after Ching Cheong was detained, he voluntarily confessed to more espionage activities than those the state security departments had known about. He also gave up his notebook computer, which contained evidence of espionage, to the authorities,” according to a document released by the court.

Seeing how the maximum penalty for spying is death, his additional dastardly espionage activites and notebook computer must contain some stellar information. None of which will see the light of day as his trial was conducted in a closed courtroom, of course.

I’ve read elsewhere that his supporters are hoping for a medical parole, although there has been no mention of his health status. I wonder what political negotiations would have to be going on in order for that to happen, and if the Hong Kong or Singapore governments value his liberty enough to do so.

Her and her sweeping indictment of foreigners working in Singapore. Sure, some will (I quote):

• Feel and consider themselves superior to the locals.
• Have a condescending attitude towards the locals.
• Think that they are here because the locals are unable to perform and deliver.
• Create a chasm between themselves and the locals. The disparity between immigrants and locals is beginning to show.
• Create social problems that tarnish the image of Singapore.

These are all a matter of a person’s character. I have certainly met my fair share of ‘fellow Singaporeans’ who have such low self-esteem they project such a level of extreme reverse racism that it makes me want to spew.

Foreigner won’t let you manhandle his girlfriend? What a racist!! Fight!!! (What male or female will be comfortable with a stranger, regardless of race, trying to touch your significant other inappropriately?)

The foreigners come here to do nothing and get paid a lot — this comes from one of my aunts, and plenty of others. (This doesn’t happen any more. Expat packages are pretty much a thing of the past. And the reason why some foreigners are hired is because the Singaporeans do not have the skills and experience to deliver. You may be unhappy with this, but the truth’s the truth.)

Racist and xenophobic Singaporeans are equally guilty of creating a ‘chasm’ — I’ve lived in Australia and China, and both times there have been ‘Singapore Clubs’. While not totally exclusionary (they organise events with other clubs), it tells me a lot, mainly that a majority of Singaporeans feel that they have to stick together. If there’s nothing wrong with that, why can’t foreigners here have their clubs / social groups too? Also, by projecting reverse racism on foreigners, Singaporeans exclude themselves.

And finally, these mysterious social problems. Like we don’t have our own Singaporeans creating ’social problems’. We have gangs, drug dealers, domestic help abusers, murderers… everyone is different, and it’s a matter of luck, so to speak. Sometimes we’ll get a foreigner who has come to Singapore because they’re running away from something (not necessarily legal problems), and have a colonial attitude. Sure. Sometimes we’ll get a foreigner who’s a dog and goes to the dodgy bars and picks up prostitutes. But most people aren’t like that. Surely we should look beyond what kind of passport everyone has and deal with each person on a one-to-one level.

We are going to get foreigners who do bad things, just as much as we get locals who do bad things. We can’t control everything, and we can’t expect the government to be psychic and know who’s got a decent character when processing their visa application. That’s life. Stop whining.

Update: another way of looking at the ‘foreign talent’ question — blaming the government as usual. Regarding NS, one of Neil’s friend’s wives got her PR status and was hoping to put her husband, currently on an Employment Pass, down as her dependent. The ICA told her he might have to do NS if that were the case. So there. While some foreigners might get special treatment, I reckon the majority would not.

Suntec Singapore completes facelift ahead of IMF-World Bank meetings — like they had any choice.

Keeping Up with the Joneses Can Put You Behind is an article from Yahoo! Finance about the social psychology of money (via Lifehacker). The primary reference is a book, Green with Envy: Why Keeping Up with the Joneses is Keeping Us in Debt, and the article states:

For instance, Andrew Oswald of England’s Warwick University and David Blanchflower of Dartmouth College found that even if our incomes are rising, we tend to become less happy if the incomes of others are increasing more.

…

Meanwhile, books like “The Millionaire Next Door” by Thomas Stanley and William Danko have documented the fact that many wealthy people got that way by living below their means and saving heaps of money. But, as Boss points out, no one looks at someone with a used car and modest home and says, “Wow, they must be putting a lot of money aside for their future!”

Sounds like a book many people I know could use.

What happens to the people who are trying to be the Joneses so that others will want to keep up with them?

I’ve just heard a broadcaster on the BBC World Service say that Kofi Annan was going to “take breakfast” with… er… someone to do with the Lebanon-Israel-Middle East situation.